


no shortage of sordid, no protest from me

by cori_the_bloody



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer (TV)
Genre: Canon-Typical Depictions of Depression, Canon-Typical Violence, Episode: s06e11 Gone, F/M, Feelings that are kinda Porny, and found a lot of too smoopy characterization, basically i got to season six in my rewatch and went looking for spuffy fic from that era, but doesn't scratch the I Want to Read About This Specific Dynamic itch, now get ready for, so here i am trying to scratch it for myself, which has its place for sure, you've heard of porn with feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-13
Updated: 2020-01-13
Packaged: 2021-02-27 05:22:29
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,778
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22241773
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cori_the_bloody/pseuds/cori_the_bloody
Summary: I don't call five hours straight a little while.- s06e15 as you were
Relationships: Spike/Buffy Summers
Comments: 15
Kudos: 82





	no shortage of sordid, no protest from me

**00 hours**

  


“Slayer.”

Buffy suppresses a shudder at the caress in Spike’s voice and busies herself brushing just-dusted vampire ash from the arms of her jacket. When she does turn, it’s to find him leaning against the entryway to his crypt, eyes leering and jaw loosening and tongue unfurling.

“Not happening.”

His eyebrow hitches in a way that makes her want to punch it immobile. “You’re the one having a tussling with death right in front of my dwelling.”

“Oh, please, Spike.” She tucks her stake into the belt of her jacket before crossing her arms over her chest. “I’m not here on purpose. I don’t have much say when it comes to which part of the cemetery vamps and fiends jump me.”

“Would you like to?”

Buffy grunts, unimpressed.

He tilts his head. “What?”

“Just…all of you.” With that lame finish, she turns her back on him.

He’s in her way before she can take more than a few steps in the opposite direction, eyes sparkling with a revelry she wishes weren’t so conspicuously absent from her own reflection these days. “All of me, what?”

She punches him—a quick jab to his temple—trying to put out the light.

His eyebrows jerk up his forehead. “Try that again, love. Use your words.”

“I’m not in the mood, Spike.”

He sways into her personal space, nostrils flared. Buffy forces herself to hold her ground, frowning sternly up at him. “Want help getting in the mood?”

“No.” Her voice is prim and final in her own ears, even though her stomach tries to twirl completely away from her at the suggestion.

He pouts. “Why not?”

“Weren’t you the one who said you wanted all of me or none at all? Well, you still only have an occasional daytime pass to one very specific part of me, and the attraction’s closed for maintenance tonight.” She cringes as her words play back to her, preparing herself for the lewd comment Spike’s undoubtedly about to make.

He surprises her. “That’s what this is about?”

“Wasn’t the first time you’ve implied your unhappy with your…park membership.”

The amused sparkle is back with a vengeance. “Think we can drop the metaphor, love.”

She goes to step around him, but he jerks into her path once again.

“I’m gonna drop you if you don’t get out of my way.”

His unimpressed smirk is almost more annoying than if he’d spoken. Almost.

“Off a high crypt.” She tries to save the threat. “Head first.”

“A bit off tonight, are we?” He’s grinning at her like she’s the timid, wooly sheep a second from being devoured by the proverbial wolf. Looking at her like she might be a demon cloaked in the skin of a young girl, after all, and he’s going to tear into her flesh until he sets her free. She’s losing battle with the voice in the back of her head that wants to know what the harm is in letting him try. “Did I hurt your feelings, Slayer?”

She channels all her disgust at the idea—and all her frustration with herself—into kneeing him in the crotch.

With Spike doubled over, she turns again to walk away. Only after going a couple paces, she finds herself right on his doorstep and inconveniently conflicted about whether she should take off to the left or the right to beat a hasty retreat.

Her hesitation costs her, and he’s there, growling in her ear and wrapping a strong arm around her waist a second later.

“Should have known you’re committed enough to the martyr act to try and break your new favorite toy.” He pulls her tight to punctuate the word _toy_ so she can feel him hard against her ass.

She grits her teeth against all the noises rising like a violent wave in her throat. “You don’t know anything about me.”

He chuckles darkly, and she feels the noise skitter down her spine and settle between her legs.

“Wish that were the case, don’t you? Then you could slip silently into the darkness, fasten it around you, and not have to wonder at why it feels like sliding home.” If his salacious tone weren’t enough, his rolling hips would surely clue her in to the fact that he means those words as dirtily as they could be interpreted.

With lips pursed almost painfully tight, Buffy hooks her foot around his ankle and jerks it forward. Thrown off balance, he falls onto his back behind her.

She spins and drops to her knees, straddling his thighs and squeezing tight to render his legs immobile. The tip of her stake is poised over his heart in an instant.

“You sure do love the sound of your own voice, don’t you, Spike?”

He pushes up onto his elbows, pressing reliably into even the suggestion of imminent danger. “Love the sound of yours too, love. Especially when you draw me deep, deep inside you and then start babblin’ about wanting me deeper still.”

She attempts to shake away the brain-fog that comes with having him in her face and begging for access…to her body…to her heart.

She forces the tip of the stake just a little harder against him, hearing the faintness in her own voice when she speaks. “I do not babble.”

He gives her a wicked grin like he knows he’s close to winning this round. “Sure you do.”

The second she increases the pressure on the stake—shifting her weight forward just a touch—he knocks it away, sending Buffy tipping forward over him. Before she can find the traction to push up and off, he’s rolling them over.

“Sorry I hurt your feelings, love.” He offers the apology to the crook of her neck, sending a wave of anticipation through her, so heady it’s nearly nausea.

“No, you’re not.”

He exhales a harsh sigh. “You always take so much convincing. Lucky for you, I’m a bloke not oft dissuaded.”

“Lucky? Not the word I’d use.”

His face appears over hers then, his eyes a not-entirely-unwelcome substitute for all the expansive wonder of the night sky. “Let’s see what we can’t do about that, hmm?”

She drags him down by the lapels of his stupid, stupidly long jacket into a rough kiss before kicking him off her. Then, she enjoys the thrill of surprising a gasp out of him for once when she pounces, tackling him back into his crypt.

  


**01 hours**

  


A cool, whisper-light pressure between Buffy’s legs rouses her from the peaceful, post-orgasm nothingness. She shifts away from it, expecting to feel the drag of Spike’s fingers as they scrabble for purchase. Instead, she only feels stone scraping at her shoulders.

Unwilling to invite the world back in but uncomfortably disoriented, she opens her eyes. The cold caress is just the wind, seeping in through the open door. She sits up.

Beside her, Spike performs an obscene combination of stretching and flexing. “S’matter, pet?”

“We never closed the door.”

“And, what? Afraid some besties got in the show of their life?”

She makes a _blech_ face. “There’s nothing that doesn’t turn you on, is there?”

This time the cool pressure between her legs does belong to Spike. “Something we have in common.”

She holds her voice firm even as her knees fall apart. Inviting him in. “We don’t have anything in common, Spike.”

“Sure we do. Loads, even.” He takes his time coaxing her open regardless, frigid fingers combing through damp curls and skating along her heated flesh. Inviting her blood to swell. “We both enjoy when you come up with some thin excuse or another to come see me.” His fingers find her clit then, and his touch might as well be the wind for all the pressure he applies while drawing tight little circles around and around. “We both love when you spill yourself all over my fingers…my tongue…my cock.”

Buffy settles back on her elbows, watching him out of the corner of her eyes. “Those are basically all the same thing.”

He tilts his head at her, eyes alight. “Not contesting that you keep making up reasons to see me, eh?”

She sighs, rolling her head in time with his still-teasing strokes. “No point. If I tell you you’re wrong, you’ll insist you know better anyway.”

“Something else we have in common, then.”

She pauses in her neck stretching to shoot him a dubious look.

He holds the eye contact, wielding it as deftly as any weapon, as he elaborates. “We both know you enjoy my company way more than you let on.”

“That is _not_ something we both know.”

“Just admit it, Slayer.” He presses just a little more firmly against her, movements unnervingly controlled. It’s not fair that he can be all cool and collected when, lately, she feels like a cyclone whenever she’s around him. Born of chaos, leaving only destruction in her wake. “Make it worth your while.”

With a disgusted grunt—though who she’s more disgusted at is a tossup at the moment—she shoves him in the chest. 

Since he was already close to the edge, he falls off the coffin onto the ground. When he doesn’t immediately shout in protest or pop back up, though, she peeks over the ledge.

She’s greeted by a swift punch to her face.

“God, Spike!” She catches him by the wrist as he’s pulling away, and he uses that to tug her down over top of him. Before she can get her bearings, they’re rolling until he’s on top, pressing his hips against her so she can feel him, twitchy and eager. “What is wrong with you?”

“Same as with you.” He waggles his eyebrows, and she aims a punch right between them, smirking at the satisfying _thud_ the blow makes when it lands. Spike laughs, though, and the grin slides immediately off her face. “Proving my point, love. Adrenaline of a good tussle gets you ready for, well, a good tussle.”

“I do not get off on—”

“Good one. Tell me another.”

She goes for his nose this time. “Maybe the possibility that I’ll permanently damage your face just makes me giddy. Ever think about that?”

A low-pitch whine puffs out of Spike before he collapses on top of her, all his dead weight pinning her to the ground. After a moment of stillness, she feels his lips slowly ascend the column of her throat. “I’d be nicer to me when I’ve got you in such a vulnerable position, love.”

She shudders. “I’ve never been nice to you. Not gonna start now.”

He laughs at that, and the loud, joyful noise is a bomb exploding inside her. Neither of them expects her reaction: using all the purchase she can find to toss him off her and across the room.

He crashes into the wall, the concrete splintering a little around the impact.

“Right, then.” He pushes to his feet and goes to wrench the door closed before turning to face her. He’s got that look in his eyes again—like he’s looking forward to clawing her open. “No niceties.”

Buffy jerks her chin up, trying to force the urge to apologize to slide back down her throat. “That’s right.”

“Too close to conceding that you get anything worthwhile from my company, that is.”

She swallows thickly, unsure what to say to that.

He’s at her side before she can decide anyway, grabbing a fistful of hair and dragging her to her feet. The pain of it sends sparks flitting across her skin, from her scalp down her back and arms.

As soon as she’s upright, she elbows at him, connecting with the hard flesh of his side. “Get off me.”

He staggers back a couple steps, nostrils flared. “Don’t get off on scrappin’, hmm?”

“Shut up, Spike.”

“Just saying, if you’re lying to yourself about that—”

“Alright, you convinced me.”

He perks up.

“I’ll fight you.”

He chuckles, and this time there’s nothing joyful about it. “My girl’s a slick one, she is.”

“Don’t call me that.”

“Come stop me.”

She shrugs, unbothered, and lurches forward to punch him twice—mouth and then, as his head snaps back, throat.

Even as he gurgles, he manages to stave off her next attack, catching her by the calf as she aims a kick at his side.

For a second, they just stand there, locked in that strange position, and Buffy realizes exactly how _naked_ she is. The completely unhelpful licking-fire of shame heats her from her center, radiating outward.

Spike grins like he can feel her temperature rising—maybe he can—and then jerks on her leg, causing her to fly backward, flat on the ground. She whimpers at the sharp pull of pain she feels along her pelvis.

It’s not nearly distracting enough to stop her from noticing him closing in on her, though. She kicks at his knee, stalling him, and then scrabbles back to her feet.

Spike recovers, too, shaking out his leg, and then they’re back in position, squaring off and circling each other.

“Are we really gonna do this?” Buffy glances pointedly around his crypt. “Looks like you just managed to patch the place back up.”

“Worried about my furnishings? ‘M touched, Slayer.”

With a sneer, she flicks her leg out—feeling that same pain in her pelvis from the overextension of her leg, this time as a weaker echo—kicking him in the chest and sending him flying within an inch of his big armchair.

“Oi! Watch the telly.”

“Stop being so annoying. Then I won’t have to kick you around this much.”

She feels his responding grin drip low into her gut. “Never been pleasant. Not gonna start now.”

“Oh, shut up.”

He laughs again as he gets to his feet, and this one is somewhere in the middle of warm and threatening. The shrapnel inside her twists, leaving infinitesimal cuts on all her organs, and she wants to throttle him for taking them the long way around; he should simply rip her open with one long gash and be done with it.

“I’ll keep singing the same song, s’long as you make it so easy, Slayer.”

She grunts, having completely lost the thread of their conversation.

He gestures for her to come closer. “Make me.”

“Do the work yourself for a change.”

With a growl, he’s lunging for her. She lets him take her this time, curling around him and absorbing the collision. The second after they hit the ground, he’s thrusting into her.

Buffy closes her eyes and waits.

A new bomb has been planted. Maybe when this one goes off, it’ll take her away completely.

  


**02 hours**

  


“Wanna play a game, love?”

Despite the excited _zing_ she feels in her stomach, Buffy takes her time cracking open her eyes to see Spike sitting up against the sagging armchair. “Is it the silent game?”

“I’m not familiar.”

“Color me shocked.”

He grins, and then produces a pack of cigarettes from thin air. “Think you’ll like this one better anyway.”

She flexes her toes, trying to see if the feeling has fully returned to her legs after their last session of knock-down, drag-out…whatever it is they do. Things are looking good. Or, at least, differently achy. “You underestimate my fondness for all my silent Spike fantasies.”

She looks up at him then, just in time to see his obscene eyebrow quirking at her in the glow of the fire as he lights up. “Fantasizing about me, are you?”

She stills completely, heat rising in her cheeks. After a moment, she forces herself to relax again. “You said something about a game?”

He takes a drag and then tilts his head back, aiming the stream of smoke at the ceiling. “I did.”

“Well?”

“It’s a work in progress, mind you.”

“Don’t worry about managing my expectations. They’re already lowest of the low.”

A chuckle rumbles out of him before he takes another draw on the cigarette, blowing the smoke away from her once again. “It’s a sort of guessing game.”

“Like ‘Guess How Long You Can Drag This Out Before I Get Pissed’?”

“Was thinking something more along the lines of ‘Guess What the Slayer Could Have Possibly Wanted by Hording My Zippo’.”

Her eyes go wide as she feels the shock of cold metal pressed against her inner thigh, down by her knee. Yup, feeling has returned, alright.

“I don’t think I like the sound of this game. Sounds unsavory.”

Spike purses his lips around the filter of his cigarette, watching her as he skims the lighter up a couple inches and then back down. “Admitting you had naughty plans already? The interrogation’s barely begun. That’s poor form, that is.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Bollocks.”

Suddenly, he’s pressing the lighter against her clit. She twitches, a hiss of surprise escaping her.

He takes another drag, casual as you please. “Want to know what I think?”

Buffy grits her teeth. “Not usually.”

As expected, he continues anyway, rolling his wrist back and forth like he’s playing a delicate string instrument. The metal starts to absorb some of her warmth. “I think this is exactly what you wanted.”

“I wanted you to annoy me while I’m trying to enjoy some orgasmy peace and quiet? Guess again.”

“Cute,” he says. And then, so fast, her human eyes can’t quite follow the movement, he’s flicked the cigarette away and is hovering over her, lighter giving off a soft _clink_ as it hits the ground between her thighs at the same time two of his fingers sink deep inside her. “But I think you know what I meant.”

Her responding moan rips out of her, scraping itself off the inside of her throat and leaving the skin raw.

“Heat doesn’t feel the same, does it? Can’t get yourself off on your own fingers anymore. Gotta have the cold, gotta make it sting so good.”

She reaches down between them to grab his wrist and still his movements. “God, you are so full of it.”

“No, love, that’d be you.” He moves his fingers in a short, shallow thrust to punctuate.

Her eyelids flutter closed but, even still, she manages to force steel into her tone. “I don’t need you to get off, Spike.”

“You choose me, then? Even better.”

A pitiful whine and an even more pathetic “I hate you” are all she can muster up in response to that. Her hand falls away from his wrist.

Free to move again, he drags his fingers out of her and then pushes them roughly back in. “You really are a terrible liar, pet.”

She forces her eyes back open. “I wasn’t going to use your lighter to masturbate.”

He studies her a moment before nodding, his thumb tenderly brushing over her clit. “Then what?”

“I—”

He’s still as the air when it’s heavy with humidity, hanging on the answer she hasn’t yet given.

She realizes her mistake then, there, pinned to the floor by that look. It’s not like she can tell him the truth; she’s pretty sure, sick as he is, that it’d only tend the smoldering fire of reverence in his eyes. The one she desperately needs to put out, to prove to herself once and for all that…

“Buffy?”

“Get off me.”

“But the game’s not nearly—”

She grasps the hair at the nape of his neck and rips him off.

“Right then.” He pauses only a second to wince before he’s popping up onto his feet. “We’ll take the long way ‘round, after all.”

She sits up in a hurry, just in time for Spike’s foot to catch her square in the jaw.

  
  


“Lighters are useful tools, y’know.”

The clouds of pain start to roll back to the edges of Buffy’s mind, making way for coherent thought.

“Can use ‘em to torch lackeys that’ve outlived their worth.”

Her eyes flutter open—she blinks rapidly, trying to banish the bleariness—and after a moment, she recognizes the underground chamber of Spike’s crypt before she spots Spike himself perched on the edge of the bed. He’s facing away from her.

“Then there’s the obvious utility.” He flicks his lighter open, ignites the flame, flicks it closed.

She groans, and then attempts to sit up. “Wha—?”

“Even used mine to escape a bind or two.”

Buffy glances up over her head. Her hands are tied together with a sheet that’s secured to one of the headboard’s posts.

“Don’t you wish you’d done a better job playing keep-away with me, pet? Bet you’d find a lighter pretty handy about now.”

“This isn’t funny, Spike. Untie me now.”

“It’s part of the game.”

“I don’t want to play anymore.”

He turns his head so she can see his profile, see him grinning. “Now, now. If that were true, you’d find a way to make your escape.”

She swallows hard and twists her wrists. The give is practically nonexistent, but he’s right. It’s enough.

He stands and starts stalking around the edge of the bed. “You don’t show up here unless you’re willing to play by house rules, isn’t that right?”

She drops her eyes down to her own chest.

Of course a silent concession isn’t enough for him. “Still not using your words, love? That’s fine. Gonna try to find a way around that.”

Her nostrils flare but, otherwise, she keeps herself still and unresponsive.

“As I was saying—” She hears the _hiss_ of the lighter producing flame “—lighters can be quite useful.”

After counting to three in her head, Buffy glances back up at him. He’s setting a thick, lit candle down next to the bed and grabbing a small, opaque bottle before crawling up next to her.

She quirks her eyebrow in question.

He rolls his eyes, but answers anyway. “Told you I was gonna teach you how to use candles in foreplay.”

She nods at the bottle. “What’s in there?”

“Oil.”

“Why?”

He swings one leg over her, straddling her hips. “Promise you’ll like it. Just relax.”

“Not a possibility right now.”

“Stubborn bint.”

She gives an earnest tug at her bonds.

Unperturbed, Spike flips open the cap and drizzles some of the oil down the center of her body. It’s colder than she’s expecting and the muscles in her stomach jump.

His hands are covering her, then, skating down the curve of her ribs and then smoothing up around the tops of her breasts. Her arms go slack, and he laughs coolly, recognizing her admission of defeat.

“Now, Slayer.” He plucks at her one nipple, then the other. “Ready to talk?”

She whines as he drags a finger down between her breasts, her ribs, toward her belly button, raising goosebumps as he goes, but otherwise stays silent.

He leans over her, hard cock pressed against her stomach, until his lips are at her ear. “Was hoping the answer’d be no.”

A shudder dances down her back at the excitement in his voice.

After tugging on her earlobe with blunt teeth—sending another battalion of goosebumps out to conquer her skin—he eases off of her so he can grab the candle.

“Now, if I were a responsible sort of fellow, I’d have chosen the safest type of candle for this demonstration.” He sprawls out beside her, holding the lit candle before her. “Low melting point, pure ingredients. That sort.”

She watches as he smooths his fingertips down the body of the candle, then back up. Shame that she finds the movement so mesmerizing tightens its grip around the back of her neck and she redirects her eyes to the small flame—Spike’s face looming ominously out of focus behind.

“However, since ‘m not one for thinking ahead or carefully laid plans…this’ll have to do.”

She’s anticipating it, that his next move is to tip the candle so hot wax splatters over her torso, but even without the element of surprise, the heat of it still draws a gasp out of her. It’s like dipping your foot in too-hot bathwater, having your nerves protest, and being unable to jerk away.

Though she dare not look, she can _feel_ Spike grinning. “Uncomfortable?”

Buffy concentrates on her breathing, relaxing her muscles in time to the stream of air she pushes out of her pursed lips. Just as the pain subsides, he splashes some more along the curve of her breast.

“Ready to tell me your designs on the lighter, pet?”

Now that she knows what to expect, it’s not even painful. The sharpness of it is pleasant, even; like squinting into the sunlight as it beats warm on your face. “Not even close.”

He trails drips up onto her nipple. “And now?”

The wax hardening around her sensitive flesh turns the heat inside her liquidy and urgent. She closes her eyes, canting up into the sensation. “Yeah right.”

Spike _hmm_ s and then spills some droplets down just below her belly button. “Ever had a Brazilian?

Her eyes pop open. “Don’t you dare, Spike.”

“Simple way to stop me, love.”

“Set you on fire?”

He clicks his tongue in rebuke. “Always so flip. Someone ought to teach you to take threats seriously.”

She jolts when the wax dribbles down between her legs, the sting much more like placing your hand on the stovetop than sinking into a bath that just needs a moment to cool.

“Tell me the truth, Buffy.”

The use of her name, falling so gently from his lips, stings worse still.

Her voice is tight when she asks, “Any truth?”

When he takes a moment too long to answer, she glances up into his eyes, which dance with intrigue.

“Suppose if I can change the rules of the game at moment’s notice…”

She nods.

He watches. And when he looks about ready to drizzle more wax, she breaks.

“It’s not the cold by itself.”

“Oh?”

“I-it’s what it represents.”

His eyebrows come together. “Which is?”

She flounders.

He allows it for only a moment before splashing her once more.

She strains against her ties, trying to squirm out from under the sear. Through clenched teeth, she gives him his answer. “Freedom. I don’t have to hold back. I’m free to lose—it’s the freedom.”

He growls possessively, and that feels like entering the bath only to find it’s been filled with wax instead of water. She tugs against the sheet some more, on the verge of lashing out like a wounded animal. Mercifully, that’s when he blows out the candle and rolls over top of her, the chill of him is a salve, her reward for telling the truth. She relaxes.

“See, pet? I told you. Keep saying you’re hiding in the dark here with me, when really you’re coming home.”

He sinks into her, then, and she moans with relief. Doesn’t matter that to sate one fire she might have stoked another. Nothing matters, not when he’s inside her, filling her brain with pleasant non-thoughts and rapid-fire endorphins.

When he’s inside her, she doesn’t have to be.

_Freedom_.

  


**03 hours**

  


“I should leave.”

“Was wondering when you were gonna start singing that tune.”

“It’s late. Dawn—”

“Is all tucked up in her bed, safe as houses and not sparing a second thought for big sis.”

“Maybe.”

“So stay.”

“And get in some Spike snuggles before my good sense returns home? Not gonna happen.”

“Don’t have to sound so disgusted, Slayer.”

“Yes. I do.”

“Not suggesting we spoon til morn. Know not to push my luck.”

“Since when?”

“Just looking for a moment of rest before we have another go.”

“But no spooning?”

“Won’t even touch.”

“Then where’s my incentive to— _oh_. There it is.”

“You never let a bloke have even one moment of peace, know that?”

“You c-can’t have peace. You’re damned.”

“An’ you can’t have peace unless I’m touching you, is that right?”

“I… Hey!”

“Sorry, love. Park’s closed for business until you admit you like spending time.”

“Fine. I should have left already anyway.”

“Bitch.”

“Let me go, Spike.”

“If that’s what you really want.”

“You’re too tired to give me what I really want.”

“Not anymore.”

“Oh, yeah?”

“It’s like I said. You never let me have a moment of peace.”

“Mm. More for me, then.”

“Was that an admission I heard?”

“Close as you’re gonna get.”

“For now.”

  


**04 hours**

  


“God.” Buffy does her best to arrange the bottles as they were before she’d started picking through them. “You really have nothing to drink here but alcohol.”

“There’s plenty of blood in the fridge.”

“Yeah, I’m not nearly that desperate.”

Spike watches her from his place on the bed, curling into the warm spot where she’d been only moments before. Like a cat chasing a sunbeam.

Only Spike does not at _all_ inspire in her the urge to cuddle. And there’s absolutely no nuzzle instinct whatsoever. Because his fluffy, sex-tousled hair just looks plain silly, really, so it’s not like she wants to press her face into it and see if it’s as soft as it seems.

He raises his eyebrows at her. “What’re you thinking?”

She swallows thickly. “That you’re a terrible host.”

Eyes narrowing, he sits up. “Oh, right, because that’s what I need. Get some juice and crackers for the kiddies. Like I want your lot traipsing about my home at all hours.”

“We already do that. Might as well make it worth our while.”

He snorts, amused, and there has to be some kind of sex-daze mind control at play because she finds herself sorta-maybe smiling back at little. Not at him, really. More at the image of Spike passing out juice boxes to a confused Willow and a horrified Xander. But still.

She’s staring at a nearly empty bottle of whiskey, waiting for her mouth to droop back into a frown and not paying attention to him at all, so she jumps a little when his hand curls around her thigh, pleading with her to come closer. She takes a step toward the bed.

“Don’t much care about the others, but I’ve a few ideas on how to make things worth your while, love.”

“I’m too thirsty to do anything remotely involving exertion.” The frown she’d been waiting for tugs at the corners of her lips. “Which probably means I should go.”

His hand travels up to caress the curve of her ass. “Can find something to do where you won’t have to exert yourself. I’m sure of it.”

She’s practically intoxicated on the offer alone—another sign that it’s time to hightail it out of there in search of water and post-sexy-time snackage. But instead of doing that, her eyes fall closed and she shuffles a little closer to him.

His lips start tracing the jutting bone of her pelvis at the same time his other hand smooths up the back of her leg. She can feel greed in each twitch and stroke, like he’s trying to fill every groove in his fingertips with her skin. Her head lolls back.

“You know, in the right light, you’re kind of a generous lover.”

All movement ceases.

She’s definitely out of her mind if she really just said what she thinks she heard herself say. No more sex for Buffy—she has no idea how to use responsibly.

She tries to slide away from him, but he holds her fast, excitable hands squeezing her ass and strong thighs trapping here there between them.

“When I say—”

She doesn’t even get to the part of the sentence where she flounders for a convincingly final explanation before he’s knocking her legs out from under her, tossing her onto the bed, and then rolling on top of her. He pauses there a moment, eyes gulping in her face like maybe he can get intoxicated off just a suggestion, too. Then he’s kissing his way down.

The fact that he’s not commenting—that he’s directing all his energy into earning her description of him—is infinitely worse than any cocky remark he might have lobbed at her. Unease twists in the pit of her stomach, even as her hand finds the back of his head. He flattens his tongue against her, and she sinks her fingers into his kitteny soft hair.

Orgasm overtakes her quickly, though it’s hard to tell if it’s more because of Spike’s eager tongue or the fact that she’s been rubbed raw by all kinds of friction. 

It occurs to her that she has no idea how long she’s been here—time mercifully passes her by during these nights, instead of forcing her to trudge through moment after moment.

Her brain skips like a nicked record when he pushes inside her; she hadn’t even registered the fact that he’d crawled back up her body until they’re face-to-face once more.

“Let’s review what we’ve learned today, shall we?”

And, oh goody, he’s talking again.

Buffy, squeezing his hips between her thighs, rolls them over. “You know what I find most exhausting about our time together?” She places a hand over his mouth as she rolls her hips and earns the damp tickle of his responding moan smacking into her palm. “Listening to you yammer.”

He finds enough leverage to suck her thumb into his mouth, and she jerks away.

“Right, and I’m supposed to hear that as an order and tighten my lips like a good little soldier because I’m such a generous l—”

She clenches her muscles in a move that never fails to make him slack-jawed…even if it’s just for a moment.

“Atta boy.”

“Easy, Slayer. Might get a fella hooked on your praise.”

“Well, everyone has an unhealthy attachment or two.”

He snorts, and she slams herself down on him hard to punish him for finding any part of this funny. To punish herself for still being here.

“Is that what you’d call this, love? An unhealthy attachment? You ashamed by how much you need me?”

“You know, I thought this time around was supposed to be light on the Buffy action, yet here I am. Doing all the work.” She digs her fingernails into his chest to emphasize her point, bouncing on him with tight, controlled movements.

“And doing so willingly.”

She pauses with him filling her to the brim and squeezes again, tracking each shift in the muscles of his face. “That’s one nice little off button you have there.”

A goofy smile unravels on his face. “Couldn’t agree more.”

She rolls her eyes. “Shut _up_ , Spike.”

He thrusts his hips up, the smile turning wicked. “Say it again.”

“When am I not saying it?” She counters his movement with her own until they’re coming together in synch.

“My name, pet. Say my name.”

She cocks an eyebrow at him. “Spike—”

“Yeah, right there.”

She aims a swift jab of a punch at his nose. “Spike.”

He winces at the pain, but instead of cradling the cartilage back into alignment, his hands find her hips. He guides her movements, pulling her down on him with increasing force. Finally holding up his end of the bargain…

“Spike.”

This time when she says it, it’s a breathless little thank you because the tides within her have started to rise up and up and up until they wash over her completely, drowning her as she comes to rest on top of him, letting the rhythm of the waves take her away.

When she comes back into herself, she thinks hopefully, _Maybe he didn’t hear_.

As with most hopes, it’s futile—judging by the gentle kiss he drops on the top of her head.

Obviously further ensnared by the sex-daze, she can’t find it in herself to cringe out from under the unwanted tenderness.

  


**05 hours**

  


Spike won’t stop kissing her.

His lips probably can’t even feel anything at this point, she thinks, except the static-y buzz of too much friction, all rubbed fuzzy and tingling ache—like her whole body.

“You have to stop,” she tells him as he caresses the crease of her elbow, lips warm from being attached to her skin for the past…lifetime, maybe. Who’s to say how long?

“Can’t.”

“Try.”

Those lips, lush with borrowed heat, dance up her bicep, paying special attention to the dips and crevices that hint at tired muscles straining for a rest.

“Don’t want to.”

He’s at her shoulder now, mouth skittering around the curve like an out-of-control car in a high speed chase. She twitches, and it feels like trying to lift a slab of stone with her pinkie alone for all the effort it costs.

“I can’t…too much.”

“That’s when it’s best, pet.” He’s nuzzling into her breast, and his fingers press down on her clit. She whimpers. “Burns, doesn’t it?”

And it does, sends hot sparks up into her belly and down through her thighs, fighting the low-hanging smog of fatigue for space. The war leaves her wrung out and exposed, unable to mediate and forced to bear witness to the full force of each sensation.

“It’s too much.”

His fingers swirl and swirl and swirl around, drawing her nerves tighter and tighter. “You want me to stop?”

A strangled whine of confirmation is all she can manage.

“All you have to do is say it.”

Tears start to gather in her eyes. “Can’t.”

He shakes his head, and his lips drag across her nipple. “Won’t.”

She summons force from thin air, surprised to find she can still access this kind of determination among the splintering and crumbling foundations of herself. “ _Can’t_.”

“Then I can’t give you what you want. Wouldn’t be fair, now would it?” He flicks her clit, blunt nails scraping it like flint designed perfectly to ignite her.

She grits her teeth against the oncoming storm of sensation. “Lying also ranks on th-the unfair scale.”

“Wouldn’t be a complete lie, and we both know it. I’m with you, Slayer. Inside you even when I’m not.” His long, graceful fingers slide easily into her.

A tear spills over, tracking down her cheek. “That’s not—love is more than just…”

“What? Wanting?”

“So much more.”

He twists inside her, searching. “But you do want me?”

She should just give in, let him burn her up from the inside. He wouldn’t be the first to leave her an emptied out husk. Not by far.

“You know the answer to that.”

“Need to hear you say it, though.”

“Want you, Spike. Want…” She trails off, leaving the rest to echo through her head, clanging the gongs of her self-hatred. _Want the cold, dead quiet you can provide_.

“Want what only I can give you.”

The fact that he can finish the thought well enough pushes her past her breaking point. 

He seems to take the orgasm as confirmation of something important. “You’re mine, pet.”

Spike was right all along. This is what they have in common, these wretchedly comfortable half-truths they tell themselves. Clinging to them at the same time they cringe away in disgust at what they’ve become. 

She does it now—cowering in the refuge of too-bright pleasure, of feelings as raw and unnamable as to push out coherent thought completely from her brain. For this moment, she can forget—that he knows her. 

That there’s a her enough left to know.

  
  


She hates the way he watches her after…after. Like he’s a greedy old Scrooge counting out the bits of her that now belong to him as though they’re gold coins.

“The sun is gonna be up soon. I should go.”

He doesn’t try to stop her this time. He’s too busy basking in his riches.

“Til next time, Slayer.” He tips an imaginary hat at her.

“There won’t be a next time.”

“Can dance to the old number all you like, pet, but we both know the music’s changed.”

She goes to punch him once, for good measure, but her entire body is sagging with exhaustion and he catches her forearm easily. With a frown, she rips her balled fist out from under the kiss he’d been painting onto her knuckles.

He doesn’t follow her upstairs, doesn’t try to hoard articles of clothing as she scrambles to don her costume…to make herself presentable again. She’d be disappointed if the numbness hadn’t already started to seep in.

As she tugs the door to his crypt shut behind her, it takes her completely, crowding in like weeds to fill up all the empty space in her chest and stomach and arms and legs. All the widening caverns inside her where scraps that she’d willingly handed over to Spike used to be.


End file.
